


in her smile

by jackgyeoms



Category: Fast and the Furious Series, The Fast and the Furious (2001)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Getting Together, Pre-Movie(s), this is pre-Brian and pre-Jesse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-05
Updated: 2015-10-05
Packaged: 2018-04-25 01:14:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4941058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jackgyeoms/pseuds/jackgyeoms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Letty’s smile had always been the same – trouble. The promise of it. The knowledge of it. The beckoning of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in her smile

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first attempt at a dom x letty story, i hope you enjoy it!
> 
> beta'd by shep

 

Dom would say the first thing he noticed was her smile.

Letty’s smile had always been the same – trouble. The promise of it. The knowledge of it. The beckoning of it. When they were kids, it had been all roughhousing, laughter through gaps in front teeth. She’d been taller than him then, and he remembered that frustrated him to no end. When his growth spurt had hit at 12, he’d never let her 10 year old ass forget it.

When they got older, it lost innocence and gained seduction. He couldn’t be sure when it had happened. It was like one moment he blinked and the kid was gone, leaving in its place someone far on their way to womanhood. When she smiled, people scrambled to appease her, whether it was to ensure their own safety or, more often than not, for a chance to get her in their beds. He found her hard to look at then, would avert his eyes unless he blind himself. And yet he’d try to make her laugh, encourage it even. Getting only a few seconds of heaven as better than none at all.

He never told her that. Hell, he barely told himself. She was almost two years his junior, a baby for too long and then still too young. He’d been content to think of her as just Letty and nothing more. He drank, he kissed, he drove, and told himself whatever he felt when he looked at Letty was because they’d grown up together and he cared. Nothing more.

He’d told her that they couldn’t be on the night of her 16th birthday, when the spiked drinks had gone to her head and she’d come at him like he was prey to be staked. He would admit that he hadn’t tried too hard to stop her when she had pressed herself close, head rested on his shoulder and words murmured with hot breath into his ear. He didn’t say anything, when the smell of her – no perfume because she was allergic to most of the chemicals used – had set his skin alight. He’d let her climb into his lap, steadied her with hands that seemed too big on her hips and chased the taste of rum on her tongue. Her pleads had broken the trance, had him force himself because he couldn’t.

He told her that.

She’d been angry of course, disappointed and bitter. Pent up frustrations he hadn’t even realised he’d been causing realised in a tirade until she was hiccupping and stumbling away, in search of someone “worth her time”. He knew that she got off with Trey Raimez that night, some kid from her year that probably couldn’t believe his luck. Dom tried not to be resentful, knew that it was the right thing to do, even if the sight of the two of them together in the weeks that followed made his blood boil and the need to punch something rise explicitly.

Vince told him that was jealous, needed to take a step back and clear his head. It wasn’t the first time that V had been right.

The relationship didn’t last long, a few weeks, a month or two. Three. Dom hadn’t been counting. He didn’t know all the details – when asked, Mia had just sighed, claimed it was a long story and pleaded the fifth, and the idea of asking Letty wasn’t something that ever lingered – but after a few days of girl time, Dom had taken Letty to the garage. They tore apart a 1966 Ford Mustang GT, something that Mr Toretto had found and wanted Dom to work on, to prove himself ready for assisting at the track, and put it back together, better than it had been before.

When he thought back, maybe that was the first time he had fallen in love with her. Hair pulled back haphazardly at the neck, grease stains marring her skin, eyes narrowed with hidden rage and concentration. She bit down on her bottom lip, and her body stretched distractingly when she reached towards the transmission. She’d always known her way around cars, her father being an antique car dealer, and had insisted that she learn as well as Mia because girls could work on cars just as well as boys could. He’d admired that about her, respected her even, because how you treat your car means everything. His father had taught him that.

“He ain’t worth it,” he told her.

She lowered her cleaning of the engine if just for a second. Didn’t look up when she said, “I know.”

“You deserve better,” he continued because he couldn’t stop himself, and this time, she did look at him. Through her fringe, her stare seemed to cut right through him. He stared back, didn’t waver. He didn’t know what she saw in him, but it had her lips quirking into a small smile, had her eyes creasing at the sides and a soft chuckle to pass from her. She didn’t elaborate and he didn’t ask.

But he thought, maybe she found some truth in him, because she seemed to certain in her ability to drive him insane. She was always there, the same Letty but different. Her clothes were tighter, sizes too small, lowered at the front so his eyes found themselves dipping between the slopes. She touched him more, things he probably wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been so aware of her. Brushing of fingers when drinks or wrenches were passed, elbows in his side during jokes, hands searing his skin when she braced herself on his chest. Those were always the first – he could feel her there for hours afterwards.

“She ain’t exactly being subtle brother,” Leon joked, slapped him on the back and winked.

Vince added, “As if Letty could ever do subtle”, and continued, “She ain’t a kid anymore. Your Da would approve.”

And he did. Or, at least, Dom believed so. Sometimes, his father could be so annoyingly cryptic, and even worse, sometimes you could walk away without realising you hadn’t understood at all. He’d asked about Letty without shame, spoke about affairs of the heart because they’d always been so open in their household, and in return, he got a retelling of how his parents had met. It was one he had heard many times before – a flat tire, a sudden stop, a smiling woman behind the counter. Fate, his mother had always described it as. He listened to his father’s words and tried to gasp some wisdom from the words, and yet nothing came.

“How does that help me?” he demanded, frustrated and confused.

His father’s look held him in place. “I’m saying love can come from unexpected places, but you and Letty – boy, I saw that coming from a mile off.” And then he smiled, ran a hand affectionately over his head and left him alone to his thoughts.

-

He sat on his hands for a while, but watched. Considered. Wondered whether they really were as obvious as his father had suggested, whether this was real or something less so. A fear pushed at the back of his mind that, if it wasn’t, the world that had built, the family they had, would crumble.

But maybe he waited too long, because then his father was dead. Screeching, fire, boom. Socket wrench. Blood.

It had been Leon that got his Ma to be Dom’s lawyer. She’d never been anything but pleasant towards him, but now he wondered whether that had been a front to hide how much trouble she truly thought he brought to her son. But she had done her job as well as could be done in the state the case was handed to her – she successfully pushed for aggravated assault rather than manslaughter as he had been charged, pleading special circumstances. Not that it changed anything. Linder was still hospitalised, and the outlook wasn’t promising, by the time the gates of Lompoc had finally closed on him.

There wasn’t really words that could describe his time there. Terrifying. Horrific. Isolated. Hell on earth. None of those seemed apt enough. He got by as much as he could with his head down, counted days, tried not to get involved. But not everyone allowed you that choice, sometimes you had to fight to stop yourself from being trodden on. Sometimes you had to tread on others. It was a fucked up system, one that became automatic within a few months. Dom supposed he was glad for that – he didn’t truly want to think about what he had to do.

It was another world within the iron pen, and even when Dom was finally released, it felt like this was a place he had never ventured before.

Mia hugged him when she saw him. It had been the first time he had been allowed that in twenty four months. She seemed to know, maybe even understand just a little, because she never said a word when he clung a little tighter, and her collar pulled away damp.

She told him quietly that she’d asked the others to stay back. She’d been crashing with Letty and her parents for the past few years, had spent less than a handful of nights in their family home since Dom’s incarceration. **“** We’ll adjust together,” she promised.

“Together,” Dom echoed, and his heart clenched. He liked the sound of it.

He didn’t see Letty for three days – that’s how long Mia could keep the gang at bay. Vince entered like Dom had never been gone; Leon only a few seconds behind with a weight of knowing in his gaze. Letty lingered in the doorway, arms folded across her chest and face twisted into that expression that read just how much she was out of her depth here but didn’t want to show it. If felt good, to see that even though she was older, taller, rounder now, that she was the same Letty under there.

They watched the movies he had missed and drank Corona that night. He had his arm over the back of the sofa, and Letty sat beside him, her warmth reminded him just how free he actually was.

-

Dom avoided the races for nearly a month, until the restlessness of his hands, of his mind, had begun to drive him crazy. There was this promise of doing better, of being better, for himself and for Mia that kept echoing at the back of his mind. Lompoc was still a real memory. He didn’t want to go back there. Didn’t want to uproot Mia again, leave her to pick up the pieces of what he had destroyed. So he tried - he attended his parole meetings, he helped at the store and then he returned home and watched evening television until he slept. He pretended not to hear the murmurs of precision parts and big money. He told himself that what he had was enough. That he didn’t need anything more.

He’d thought it was something that Mia had agreed on until she came downstairs, dressed up more so than for her usual study evenings. He eyed her quietly, wondered whether she had always been that grown up and tried not to think about it.

“Get dressed,” she ordered, “I laid clothes out for you.”

Laid clothes out.  Like he was still a child. He scoffed a laugh, took a drag of his beer and eyed her critically. “Alright Ma.”

Her arms folded across her chest, and her face set. Business. “Upstairs. Get dressed,” she repeated her orders slowly, “We’re going racing.”

He tried to refuse, acted as if the promise of rumbling engines and motor oil wasn’t like a fucking dream to him. She told him that he didn’t have a choice. Said that he was getting out of the house.

“You’re driving me crazy,” she informed him, and added, “You need a release.”

Mia was right of course, but he didn’t realise just how much until she had pushed the keys to her Mitsubushi into his hand. He took the driver’s seat and tension bled away. He adjusted what he needed to, took more time than he should of, and Mia never said a word. Allowed him the time, allowed him to familiarise himself with the vehicle again. He had restored it, was one of the first cars he had worked on by himself. He knew every piston, every gear, the very heart of the engine, and with a turn of the key, they all called out in greeting to him.

He breathed.

Two years and the race scene hadn’t changed. Half-dressed racer chasers scattered between cars and their drivers, some already decided on who they would go home with and others still deciding, just waiting for the right one to draw in. The music thumped along with the purr of engines. Voices, chattering, about the important and the juvenile. Wages were exchanged, hands shook. Dirt talk spat with humour behind each word, because here, it was about the racing. About winning or losing, and no one was up for dealing with some loser’s bullshit. Dom sat in the car for longer than he needed to, just watching, just adjusting. Mia didn’t say anything, but after a time, she laid her hand over his, still clutching the steering wheel, and drew him back into the present.

She smiled lightly, airily, without judgement. “Want me to put the bid for the next race?”

He nodded jerkily, not trusting himself to speak, and Mia squeezed around his hand before she made her leave. The door opened, let the noises of the world in for a second before it shut and they muffled again. He could still here everything though – the cheerful greetings of his sister’s name that made him realise that maybe cars and racing were just as important to her as they were to him. That, even in his absence, maybe because of it, she had come here. No doubt given everyone a run for their money. It almost made him smile.

He saw Mia gesturing towards him, saw the eyes that went in search for him. He’d been someone to notice before, someone who had earnt the respect he received. Now, he had to earn it back.

Maybe life outside Lompoc wasn’t too different.

He recoiled at the thought.

He didn’t see Letty making her way towards him, her determined stride having people dart to get out of her way, but he heard the door open beside him and the world that flooded in. He jerked slightly, tensed so he didn’t lash out – he had before, to Mia, to Vince, and he was training himself to stop, reminded himself that there was no danger here – and his eyes narrowed on her.

She smirked at him, a knowing lift to her lips. Trouble, the past recalled. Still the same.

“You racing?” she questioned.

Dom forced himself to answer, aware of the gruffness of his voice when he said, “Yeah.”

“Me too,” she informed, and then latched on as an afterthought, “My own car.”

When he had left, he remembered Letty complaining about her lack of wheels. She’d been working part time after school to save up, didn’t want to have to ask her mother – the woman had worked so much that she was never around, and Dom understood the money issues the Ortiz’ family had to contend with, he had to deal with the same. He remembered her running engine names past him, talking paint jobs with Vince and customisation with Leon. He’d been amused by it, found her impatience endearing. He’d been thinking about giving her one of the models he and his father had been working on. He hadn’t gotten around to asking before the accident.

Thoughts, feelings – all the regrets of what could have happened – what _should_ have happened – made his throat tighten. “Oh yeah?”

If Letty was aware of his rawness, she didn’t mention it. She hummed and her smile brightened a little. “1964 Ford Mustang,” she told him.

“American muscle,” he stated. He shouldn’t have been surprised.

She flashed her teeth. “Well, I’ve always had a thing for American muscle.”

It felt like a confession and a promise all rolled into one. He looked at her as if, the longer he looked, the more secrets he would uncover. But whatever she was trying to say, she wanted him to work for it, because her eyes sparkled with challenge and her lips pressed into distraction. She told him that she wasn’t going to go easy on him.

“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t,” he told her, and she laughed like she knew.

She wished him luck – “Enjoy my tail lights,” – and climbed from the car. Noise increased. Decreased. Dom watched her hips as she moved, the surety of her steps, felt hot under his collar when she glanced over her shoulder at him. Just making sure she still had his attention.

Dom wasn’t sure she had ever lost it.

-

Dom won, although he would admit easily that Letty gave him a run for his money. If she hadn’t pushed too early, she would have won.

She swayed up to him and slid the winnings into his hands, and promised next time, next time, she would own his ass. He asked whether than meant, this time, he owned hers. And she laughed, head thrown back, hair cascading down her back and for a moment, he was entranced.

“Oh, keep dreaming big boy,” she mocked, patted the centre of his chest condescendingly and left him with a cool space that he didn’t think anyone else was going to fill.

-

He decided to open the garage after two weeks of restless hands. It had been questioned a few times whether he was going to do it, continue his father’s legacy, and he’d been reluctant to. Since he’d gotten home, he had kept the double doors firmly padlocked in place. It had been that way since his father’s death, and the idea of disturbing the tomb it had become terrified him. It felt like an abandonment of the past – or maybe it felt like opening yet closed wounds. So with each inquiry, he’d swallow around nothing, force a smile and make some excuse of not needing the responsibility right now.

But, like with street racing, getting under the hood of a car was something he needed, and he wasn’t likely to forget that.

Mia was with him the first day. The lock squeaked from lack of use, and fell with a resounding thud to the concrete. Everything was the same as it had been left, abet covered in years’ worth of dust – the tools organised in his father’s nonsensical way, the lift suspended in space, a decaying can of soda, and in the centre of it all, the ruin of the Charger. Dom hadn’t seen it, hadn’t wanted to, but when the authorities said they would dispose of it, he had refused. The day, the moment, had never left his mind, but seeing it took the wind from him.

Mia had to lead him out.

He didn’t come back for another week. This time, he steeled himself against the onslaught of emotions. He worked methodically, cleaned and cleared, wiped, swept, threw out the festering garbage. He check over each tool separately, tried not to remember the first time he had been allowed to use them, or all the times he had watched his father move with them. He got the electricity switched back on, the gas and the water. He made sure everything was functional. He dutifully ignored the tarp in the corner.

He went to Harry’s, put the word out that DT’s was officially open for business. Answered the racers with a shrug and a brief, “bring it to the shop and I’ll see what I can do”. His name still carried weight, was growing in remembrance the more time he spent proving himself. But it wasn’t steady work. Racers tended to deal with their own shit, have their own skills and mechanics to do what needs to be done, and if they don’t, the parts they need tend to go up into the thousands range. Good money, but an unreliable hassle. His dad had balanced out the books with regular clients – soccer moms, families, elderly men.

But his father had been respected, and Dom’s name was surrounded with cell door’s slamming.

Mia sent in her college buddies. Vince mentioned the place at work, to bartenders and patrons alike. Leon told the kids at the youth centre he worked at as part of community service – the guy had never been good at paying speeding tickets.

Letty helped with the cars. Her part time job at Razor’s Edge only ate up a few hours each day. Morning shifts, and then afternoons, she was DT’s. He hadn’t asked for the assistance – had been working on the breaks of a Ford Convertible, when her loud strides came to his door. He’d rolled the creeper out from under the car to consider her. She’d been dropped in shadow, the sun behind her making her almost too bright to look at.

“Where’s the overalls?” she asked, and he gestured silently. Her eyes darted in their direction, and then back to Dom. Nodded sharply, and made her ways towards them.

He called after her, “You know I can’t pay you”, and she replied with “I’ll accept dinner”.

Dom had forgotten how good this place would feel with laughter. It wasn’t the same of course – not without his father’s deep rumble, or his sister’s glee. Not without Len and Reno and Bruce shooting wisecracks over the engines. But Letty’s, god it was almost enough. There wasn’t a moment of silence, not since she had turned up on her third day with a stereo and a Latin beats mix. There wasn’t a moment of stillness, not with the tapping to the beat of the music, or the thoroughness of which she checked over each and every car. There wasn’t a moment to think of the past, not with Letty being so very real and there, all smart mouthed and sexy and demanding of his attention.

She made continuing easy.

-

“She waited for you,” Mia informed him once, her voice low and barely audible over the ruckus in the next room. Another race night, another party. People littered and breathed life into the house once more.

Dom said, “I never asked her to.”

“You didn’t have to,” was Mia’s reply.

-

It was inevitable that they would fall together. It was as Dom had almost expected it to be – adrenaline pumping through veins, still feeling the phantom rumbling of an engine, eyes blown and lips wet. They’d closed up the garage to test just how smoothly the GT would run, had punched the gas again and again, until Letty’s laughter had become part of the wind around them. The view that whistled past them was nothing compared to her beside him – head tipped back, eyes closed, lips stretched and parted with her own glee. And she’d looked at him, and maybe she’d known then exactly how this drive would end.

It wasn’t nice or sweet or romantic. It was fucking – a collision of flesh, bruising touches and impatience driving them through faster and harder. Letty swiped at the garage door, sending it unsteadily against the other one, and making the whole thing shake. Not locked, anyone could walk in, but Dom couldn’t bring himself to care if Letty didn’t. She kissed him then, backed him against the GT’s door, and demanded a surrender from him by pure force. He took it and gave it back.  He used his strength to pull her where he wanted her – to lift her off the ground and force her legs around his, to pin her to the hood of the car and make her back arch. She moaned and laughed and fought.

He left marks on her – bites on her neck, inner thigh; hand prints on her hips and arse as if they were brands of ownership. She returned the favour, lipstick stain on his mouth, scratches on his back, teeth marks on his shoulders and pecs.

It happened so fast and they were left panting into each other’s shoulders, shivering from the breeze against their sweat laden skin. He didn’t pull out, not at first, just enjoyed being surrounded by Letty’s everything in a way that he’d never gotten to before. Her hands, softer and unclawed, stroked around the curve of his head, down his neck and shoulders and back again.

Of course it was Letty that spoke first. She always hated the silence. “So that happened.”

He breathed a laugh into her skin, “Yeah.”

Another pause before – “We’re doing that again, right?”

He ran his hand down the side of her body, traced the underside of her breasts and the line of her hips. “I ain’t complaining.” He stopped and added, “We’ll make it to the bed next time.”

When Letty laughed, it shook through him. “Hmm, how romantic,” she teased.

He tilted his head up, and met her gaze. Eyes heady with lazy desire and amusement, hair messed and wild around her head, she’d never been more beautiful. “I’ll try,” he promised. It felt important that she know that.

Her hand halted on his head for a moment, before she smiled again. It was as subdued as he had ever seen her, honest maybe, soft at the edges, and it made her eyes seem brighter. She rubbed at his crown affectionately, and said, “I believe you.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> feedback is appreciated!
> 
> i have tumblr, [@domtorctto/deadtoretto (for halloween)](http://gladers.co.vu) \- if you have any prompts, or wanna talk feelings, leave me a message there!


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